So, I took the Greyhound up to New York City on Friday, with the plan that I'd stay with a college friend that lived in Long Island. Another friend was coming, and we'd all go down to Steve's memorial the next morning. Well, that was the plan, anyway.

The Greyhound was over an hour and half late- the New York City Tunnels are an absolute nightmare of traffic, though it was cool to see the New York City skyline complete with the new World Trade Center. The one and only time I had set foot in New York City was twelve years ago, and the skyline looked pretty different from what I remembered. Lots of new buildings seem to have sprouted up. I walked around Times Square/Broadway, which was just as chaotic and noisy and wonderful as I remember it being. After that, I took the Long Island Railroad (known as the Lirr) to my friend Tim's place. Our friend Brett, who comes from Rhode Island, had come down and was already at Tim's house. The evening started out pleasantly enough, with us just catching up on our lives. Brett had gone back to school for video game design, while Tim was teaching English at a charter school in the City.

Tim's band was playing a gig at some dive bar, and it was an alright time. I was pissed off about paying 5 bucks for a freakin' Pabst, but otherwise I had a lot of fun. His band was good, some of the other bands were pretty good, and it felt like a nice callback to college when I had friends who were playing in local bands. There was one particular moment where I rocked out to this cover of "Dreams" by the Cranberries which was fun as hell. And Brett and I had a pretty good conversation revolving around the grief thing, which I really needed because I really, really needed to be physically around people who knew and care about Steve. That's been the one big thing I've been missing in processing this.

We left and then hit a really unfortunate sidetrack. Not to go too much into details, but on our way back to Tim's place, Tim made a few wacky moves that got the attention of the cops. We were pulled over, the cop immediately accused Tim of being high as a kite, and then they found a stash in the car. There are a few more details there, but I can't really say much except that he's facing some very serious charges that could get him jail time. (I'm also extremely glad that I don't touch that stuff.) He got arrested, his car got impounded, and we had to sit out in the parking lot next to a Wendy's to wait for Tim's parents to pick us up. I have never experienced watching a friend get busted like that. It was the most bizarre feeling to deal with seeing a friend's entire life getting wrecked while knowing that we were also going to mourn a lost friend the next day.

The ride back was extremely awkward, to say the least. Tim's father was angry as fuck- although he calmed down towards me because I was honest in telling him that I did not partake in anything that night. We literally had to sleep in the basement of Tim's parent's house while Tim was spending the night in jail. Tim's mother was very upset, and when I offered her a hug she pretty just sobbed for a little bit in my arms. It really made me think about what it would be like as a parent to see your kid make such a massive fuck-up...I just felt so bad for Tim, who is in serious danger of losing his teaching license, and his mother, who has to watch her son hit rock bottom.

It REALLY put things in perspective, because I've been whining about my failed non-paid internship and the fact that I won't ever get a chance to work with that state agency again, and now I'm seeing a friend who is facing very serious charges that could basically render his teacher's training useless. Needless to say, we didn't sleep, and the next morning we had the awkwardness of talking to Tim's brother, who was understandably upset as hell.

I was anxious to get the hell out of there, so we started our way towards New Jersey. Unfortunately, we were hit with traffic from hell in trying to get onto the Lincoln Tunnel, and it delayed us enough that we basically missed the actual memorial service. We literally got in there as someone was saying, "Now this concludes the memorial service." I watched from the door, and as they filed out, I looked for Ethan, who I wrote about in a previous blog that was Steve's resident at their dorm. When I saw him, I gave him a big hug and I knew I was close to losing it. Then Steve's girlfriend came up to me and told me that it was great to finally meet me, because Steve had talked so much about me and how much my friendship meant to him. I was then a blubbering mess for a couple seconds, and I managed to croak out, "It meant a lot to me, too." Steve's girlfriend and Ethan comforted me for those few moments, and I cannot tell you how much that meant to me, and how much I had been screaming out for a chance to mourn with people who loved him as well.

Then at the lunch reception, I met Steve's parents. I met his mother first, who thanked me for sending out the card that I did back in December, and then she mentioned how much Steve would talk about me. I got the same general reception from Steve's father, who also mentioned that Steve did mention me a lot. When that happened, I felt like it was confirmation about how much Steve really cared for me as a friend, and as someone who has often been made to feel like he has to apologize for his existence, that was everything to know I really did have that. It was the reason why I knew there wasn't a chance in hell that I'd miss this, and even though I missed the actual ceremony, being able to meet with and talk to the people who also loved Steve was everything.

One really cool thing was that I learned that someone had printed out the Facebook cell photo I had taken of Steve, enlarged it, and framed it...his parents loved the photo, which made me glad. I also talked with Steve's brother, which was also hard, because his brother looked a lot like Steve and I couldn't help but see Steve. But it was great telling him funny stories about my days on the U.D. campus with Steve.

Aside from his family, I talked with his friends from high school as well as his Residence Life comrades, which was great- mixed with the tears there were also a lot of laughs and remembering of the good memories we had of him.

After that, I managed to snag a ride from someone going down to D.C. (The original plan was that Tim would drive me back to Manhattan in time for my 8 p.m. bus departure and well you know how that went.) On the ride back, I looked up at the sky. It was beautiful out, big and blue with perfect fluffy clouds. I pictured Steve looking at me, smirking a little. I felt a massive sense of peace. Despite all the crap I had to go through in order to get there, I finally got to say my proper good-bye.